However, Gwen Stefani has a pretty good excuse–she’ll (possibly) be in Los Angeles finishing up No Doubt’s first new album in 10 years, which we are so excited about that we’re pretty sure we can forgive her. Plus, with three clothing lines (including Harajuku Mini which launches at Target in November), two fragrances, and Zuma, she has a lot on her plate.

A spokesperson for L.A.M.B. told Page Six, “Given the extraordinary demands of working on three fashion lines while also finishing a new record, it is hard to say whether she will be able to attend the actual presentation in New York next month.”

This makes us wonder how important Gwen Stefani’s presence at her show really is. L.A.M.B. shows are always entertaining in their own right, but the spring 2012 collection will have a little less star power without its designer there. This No Doubt album better be good!

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As a solo artist and as lead singer of band “No Doubt,” Stefani has sold over 30 million albums worldwide. But her influence stretches far beyond music.

Her innate sense of style and unbelievable power to start trends has created one of the most successful celebrity fashion labels — LAMB.

“For me it’s not that deep,” says Stefani. “For me the line is genuinely for myself. I want to make a line of clothes that I want to wear — it’s kind of selfish.”

Selfish or not, it’s the key to her brand’s success.

ince 2004, LAMB (Love Angel Music Baby) has created a line of clothing Stefani has not only had a hand in designing, but has been regularly seen wearing — the range epitomizing her “look” and her “personality.”

“I think fashion is more of a fun sort of thing,” Stefani says. “It’s an expression of yourself and your personality and your mood, it’s not something we take super deep.”

“I’m not going to ever be a Vivienne Westwood … ” she adds. “I’m trying to make clothes to wear everyday, that’s what LAMB is. It’s not a couture line.”

“What qualifies me? I don’t have qualifications really. I don’t have technical qualifications. I just have a vibe of what I like and I have strong opinions about what I like and what is me.”

Despite this lack of “technical qualifications,” Stefani has had a long love affair with fashion — designing many of her early stage outfits for performances with No Doubt.

“I just always liked getting dressed up and playing with make-up and hair,” says Stefani. “My mum and her mum and her mum, they all made clothes … every holiday we would go to TJY, a little fabric store, and look at patterns and pick out our outfits.”

“When I started with the band, when I was 17, I would waste all my time at school thinking about it (fashion) and drive to the fabric store and just find stuff.

“I didn’t know how to sew very well, it really was like using glue guns and velcro and just trying to make it work. I think it all came from the music really — just trying to find fun outfits for the stage.”

For Stefani, music and fashion have always been intertwined.

“Music is the fire, so I have to start there … always pull from the same inspiration every season, always from music,” she says.

“But singer or fashion designer, that’s tough because they go hand in hand.”

Ironically it was the thought of a declining music career which prompted Stefani to set up the fashion label.

“I started the line honestly because nine or 10 years ago I didn’t know how long I would be doing music.

“They ask you ‘What are you going to do in 10 years,’ and I didn’t know, I just though by then I want to have a family and I’m not going to be doing music but I wanted to do something creative.”

Seven years on and Stefani is still creating chart topping music and still has her finger on the creative pulse — creating her own style, be it in music or fashion.

“I think everyone has a style, style is just your personality. I don’t know if it’s better or worse, I think fashion is not that deep. It’s clothes, it’s just fun.”

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Gwen said her show was comparable to six miniature fashion shows in one because of the variety of themes she presented. “The themes are things that I always draw from like the raggamuffin girl, and the English girl, the buffalo girl… things that I’m a fan of.”

When it comes to past fashion faux pas, Stefani says, “There is no fashion mistake, you’re always in the moment. You can’t look back and go, ‘Oh man, what was I thinking?’ That was me then, no regrets.’”

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RZ: You have been a prominent fashion and music icon for over fifteen years. How does music influence your personal style, both in your own wardrobe and L.A.M.B.?
GS: Music and fashion have always come from the same creative place inside of me. So if I’m really inspired by something musically, chances are that inspiration will also come up in what I’m wearing and in what I’m designing.

RZ: The world of L.A.M.B. is an umbrella, which encompasses apparel, accessories, footwear and all—how do you balance it all? Do you take on each area with the same design approach?
GS: There are certain common themes and inspirations that you see in most everything I do. There’s the juxtaposition of masculine and feminine and Hollywood glamour mixed with bold prints and Asian-inspired designs. I also have amazing teams that I collaborate with for each project, which makes it all possible. Collaborating is a big part of everything I do whether it’s music or fashion. I love the whole creative process in general and I always love to have an opinion so it makes a difference when you get to collaborate with great people.

RZ: I love the print perfect vibe of your is S/S 11 collection, what was your inspiration behind it?
GS: I always love prints but I also think they are really hard to do. But with the spring collection I really think we got it right. One of my favorite prints of the collection is the butterfly print, which was actually born out of a piece of fabric that was initially a mistake. Fashion is funny that way…inspiration and ideas can come from the most unexpected places sometimes.

RZ: You are never fully dressed without _____ .
GS: I’m prepping for my fall show right now and I can’t wait to wear the amazing fall jackets in a few months.

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Gwen and I went straight to posing for the photos you see here, while discussing hair coloring, Heathers, and the time we’d previously met (it was supercool that Gwen remembered me a year later!). When the photographer suggested we look more active, Gwen would say things like, “Let me show you this purse!” in a sarcastic way that poked fun at how awkward it was to create the illusion of natural conversation through midsentence expressions. Even better was when she pointed to a botched sample bag and smiled for the camera, uttering through clenched teeth: “See these little dots? They make me want to punch someone.” Her dryly humorous but composed anger reminded me of her attitude in the video for No Doubt’s “Just a Girl.” This isn’t to say she wasn’t stoked about the collection, just smart enough to care about the conditions of her designs. Excited to show it to an outsider and receive feedback, she had stories behind each piece, many of which gave African-inspired fabrics a streetwear shape. A few of my favorite things (Gwen’s not the only one who can reference The Sound of Music!) included an optic bag, a butterfly-print dress, and deconstructed jeans.

In discussing how the brand came about, she said she didn’t want to name it after herself and that she hopes those who buy her clothes do so for the garments, not her celebrity. As Gwen showed me different ways she’d style a pair of what she nicknamed “jailbird pants,” an old video I’d seen on YouTube came to mind: Gwen is 22, pre-fame, and showing the camera a DIY “jailhouse dress.” That use of personal identity is what makes her designs not derive from tabloid appearances but act as a further reflection of her as an artist. Like her music, they embrace a side of her that is unabashedly unique, whether she executes it through kaleidoscope prints or by singing a friendly reminder: “It’s my life!”

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Coming off of their major successes at Fashion Week in New York City (NYC) this past September, L’Oréal Professionnel and L.A.M.B. decided to take their show on the road by hosting a series of exclusive regional cocktail events and fashion shows across the US. These intimate events have taken place in Atlanta, Chicago, and San Francisco showcasing both Stefani’s Spring/Summer 2011 L.A.M.B. collection and L’Oréal Professionnel’s high-end product lines, most notably their INOA hair color which made its runway debut at the L.A.M.B. show in NYC. The series is winding down in what would be an appropriate location for the last show, Stefani’s own Orange County.

L’Oréal Professionnel has tasked Orange County’s leading hair stylist, Donato Bianchini and his team at Vogue Salon, to serve as its ambassador utilizing INOA and the rest of the L’Oréal Professionnel line of products to provide the models with hair inspired by and that complements the stunning L.A.M.B. collection. INOA, which is an abbreviation for “Innovative No Ammonia” and is ammonia free as its name implies, has become a star in its own right appearing on “The Today Show” and in the pages of countless magazines. Vogue Salon’s ability to manipulate and expertly apply INOA in concert with the other L’Oréal Professionnel products is just one of many reasons that they were selected to support this special show.

When asked how he felt about L’Oréal Professionnel’s decision to work with Vogue Salon, Bianchini fervently stated, “The team at Vogue Salon work very hard to ensure they are staying at the forefront of their respective fields. The fact that we’ve been chosen to do the hair for the L’Oréal Professionnel/L.A.M.B. show is a reward for that hard work.” Bianchini wryly added, “We love L’Oréal Professionnel products and we’re doing great things with INOA which also helped [with L’Oréal Professionnel’s decision] I’m sure.”

Preparation for the models will take place prior to the show on October 24th from 10AM-6PM at Vogue Salon’s Newport Beach location but will also involve stylists and colorists from its other location at the St. Regis Resort in Dana Point. The invite-only cocktail event and fashion show will be held at restaurant and nightclub, Sutra in Costa Mesa, CA from 7-9PM that same evening.

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You can use the links below to preview and bid on the auctions!

L.A.M.B. black and grey bomber-style jacket
L.A.M.B. leopard-print belted jacket

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The singer’s collections for L.A.M.B. have been a critical and commercial success, and she loves coming up with ideas for new lines. Gwen is married to musician Gavin Rossdale, who she has two kids with. She loves his rock’n’roll sense of style, and says his look often makes it into her collections.

“We just do our own thing, and it always seems to work. He has such great style,” she told The July issue of British magazine InStyle. “I get ideas from a lot of his clothes for the women’s clothing line because I like that kind of mixture. I use a lot of stuff in his closet. I’ll be like, ‘Ooh, we should do a girl version of this!’”

Gavin also impacts another area of Gwen’s life. She is renowned for her polished appearance and dedication to make-up, and has revealed she always wears red lipstick because that is what Gavin likes.

“I wear it all the time. I wear pink, I wear gloss, I wear everything, but my husband prefers when I wear red. I want him to like me still!” she explained. “I remember the first time I wore dark red lipstick. I was maybe 18, and I can remember the moment I put it on — in my Honda Prelude that I bought for like, $3,000 — and looking in the mirror going, ‘Good, I like that.’ Never again did I stop wearing it.”

From Indy Posted

The No Doubt star says she’s no catwalk queen.

“I do get nervous right before the girls go out, and I don’t like going out there myself,” she said.

“The catwalk is just a different place to the stage. I find it so much more scary. Everyone is there and can be critical about your work. I’m proud of my work but it’s a daunting place to be.”

Stefani recently admitted the success of her fashion line has taken her by surprise.

“I’m still so blown away that we’ve got this far,” she said in September last year.

“When I first started, I really didn’t know what I was doing at all.

“I mean, I’ve made clothes my whole life, but I was just naïve about the fashion world. “But I think it’s [successful] because I’ve been really involved, you know?

“Picking the samples, inspirations, color palette. I have a great team of people helping me.”

From Showbiz Spy

“It was a challenging couple days with the blizzard, Chinese New Year, Federal Express, child with an earache,” Stefani told us. “But I feel like all that stuff brought on a lot of creativity. We came up with a lot of looks that we wouldn’t have thought of without the pressure.” The show must go on, right? “It crossed my mind that we didn’t have all our looks, but I didn’t think about canceling,” she said, adding that she’d managed to get to bed around 1:30 the night before her presentation. She seemed intent on setting an earlier curfew this night and was long gone by the time Josh Hartnett came by and got a kitchen tour from Surf Lodge chef Sam Talbot.

Also party-hosting within the multi-space Milk location were LnA’s Lauren Alexander and April Leight. The L.A.-based designers celebrated their first-ever New York show with a crowd that included Heidi Mount, Ally Hilfiger, and Genevieve Jones. Late night, the suddenly ubiquitous Patti Smith took the stage for a set that included crowd favorite “Because the Night” and a song she dedicated to Alexander McQueen. She left the crowd with this: “If we have lost loved ones, the best way to cope is to celebrate life.”

From Style.com

Her design aspirations:
I just want to make stuff that I want to wear . . . Stuff I want to wear every day that’s to the left enough that it makes you feel unique and individual, but also you can wear it. That’s my ultimate goal . . . I think the collection has a lot of that in it . . . That’s the hardest thing to do. It’s easy to make some glamorous dress and put all of your energy into that. To make that T-shirt that you just throw on that’s actually cool and funky and makes people go, “Whoa!” When they’re jealous, that’s what I want to do.

To hear what else Gwen said and to see her Fall ’10 line, read more.

On the Fall collection:
The collection is kind of based on this vintage, naughty Hollywood girl — starlet girl, and then a little bit of a modern, futuristic girl, and a little bit of a soldier girl . . . What I’ve learned is that you kind of have the inspiration, you have the picture, you have an idea, and what I love about fashion and about doing it is that it just sort of evolves into whatever it’s going to be . . . A lot of things drop out, a lot of things don’t make it, but at the end of the day it’s like the creative process of that picture and that drama that makes you very creative and come up with things that you wouldn’t. And some of my favorite looks of the show are things where we were like, “There’s nothing on this rack!” And then you put it together, and there is actually something on the rack. I can’t wait to see it all together, with the music, and the girls, and the girls look so beautiful. They blow my mind.

On trend she’s looking forward to:
I just love when things that I love come back into trend. It’s funny because it does recycle, doesn’t it? I don’t really know what the trends, are; obviously my team kind of does that thing and I listen, whatever I like I just kind of go for.

Current trends she’s loving:
My whole life I always wore men’s pants, trousers, and would be that look. And I had to fight for years to try to get people to like want me to — and now they’re in. They’re gonna always be in for me. Like when they’re out, I’ll still wear trousers.

From Fab Sugar